New MSN APIs to debut Tuesday

[Via MP2KMag.com]

At PDC on Tuesday (13th) Microsoft will unveil a new collection of APIs for it's MSN services to be available from http://msdn.microsoft.com/msn, these will include:-

• MSN Search Web Services
• MSN Messenger Activity API (already available here)
• MSN Virtual Earth API

The last item is interesting. Firstly it sounds like this will be a "proper" documented API, rather than the jscript hacks currently available. Secondly it is being offered free for both commercial and non-commercial use. It is interesting therefore to see how it stacks up against it's big brother Mappoint Web Service for simple commercial applications.

Speaking of which, the new version of Mappoint Web Service (4.0) will also be released at PDC. New features include support for polygons, some new map styles, and further extensions to the mapping coverage.

[Update] MWS 4.0 SDK is available:-

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=cb5148a9-f09e-4ec8-992f-16478c0b5d9a&DisplayLang=en